Eric Rizen Lynch

Ask Rizen

I'm a few days late on this, but starting next week it will be on Fridays again. I've been taking a much needed post WSOP breather. Been playing a fair amount of PLO cash but taking frequent breaks and spending time with the family when I can. Please feel free to keep sending in questions for 'Ask Rizen'. If I haven't answered yours yet I'm not ignoring you, I have about 20 questions or so in the queue and I usually answer 3 each week, but I try and answer every question I get either here or by private e-mail. Don't forget about the special tournament on Lock Poker Monday at 9pm ET. I will be playing that as well as the two private PXF sub tournaments tomorrow. There are several ways during the Lock Poker tournament to win free one on one coaching with me as well as cash prizes obviously.

Q: Eric, in a tournament late stages MP you have a medium stack and pick up QQ you raise and are reraised by the button. How do you proceed?

A: Like any other poker situation this is largely an 'it depends' situation. That being said it would be VERY rare that I would run across the type of player who I would ever be looking to fold against here. Assuming a medium sized stack is in the 30 big blind range or so, I would get all my chips in the middle pre-flop pretty close to 100% of the time here unless I had a VERY strong read.

Q: In Winning Poker Tournaments...." in hand 77 you reasoned that there was a good chance he had a weak ace yet you still pushed your stack giving him about 3 to 1. The blinds werent tearing him apart and he did fold but how did you know the guy would fold? Whatever you bet, if he called then you lose. Was he tight passive? I dont think I would have folded an ace there having the hand go down the way it did. you an pearljammer have very different approaches yet they both work. help me understand your cognitive process here. books great so far. however i'm having some difficulty putting myself in your shoes through a number of hands.

A: Actually, in hand 77 I said that there was a slight chance he had a weak ace, and most of his range consists of draws that on the turn miss. On the flop on that hand I didn't even put a weak ace in his range, and on the turn my exact wording is 'Even if he did call pre-flop with some sort of weak ace...' which at least the intent was to address that there is some non zero chance that he could have an ace here. So in short, my reasoning was that a vast majority of the time he has a missed draw here with one card to come, and even when he does happen to have a made hand, it's not an easy call for him.

Q: The WSOP this year is now letting players unregister after an event has started. If the the player doesn't show up for the first two levels of play, their stack is removed and their money refunded. I know the WSOP is doing this to generate more revenue, but at first glance I think the whole idea is just horrible. As a player, you can wait and see which seat you were assigned and then if you don't like your table you have the option to just sit the event out. It just seems a lot less fair to me. What's your opinion on this matter and do you think the change is here to stay?

A: Obviously this question was sent in right before the WSOP, but I do think it's here to stay. I can understand both sides of the argument here, but honestly I think this rule has little likelihood of being abused. I'm assuming the WSOP did this to combat player complaints, particularly from players who registered for events early then had extenuating circumstances that cause them to miss the event, and then ask for a refund after the fact. It's much easier logistically to just take the stack out of play after two levels and refund everyone so that no one gets caught up in an odd situation. People could potentially abuse it, but for the most part we're talking about WSOP events here. There aren't a whole lot of events where you're going to be faced with tables so tough you would consider not playing, and even so tables break and things happen. While people could abuse it I just don't see it happening very often at all and even if it does it really doesn't hurt the other players at all. I honestly have a bigger problem with the rule that allows you to register, get your seat card, unregister, and then re-register again, which essentially allows you to switch seats before an event starts if you happen to learn something about your table you don't like.

The honest truth is though the WSOP has made a lot of strides the last few years that I've seen. It's not perfect, but most of the rules are pretty good at this point. I personally don't have a problem with this rule, but I can see how some players might, even though I think the impact it actually has on the game is pretty minimal. From an administrative point of view I can see this rule cutting down on A LOT of headaches and player complaints. I think the good outweighs the bad here.

-Rizen